Welcome to the Lansdale Life Church podcast.
If you're seeking a closer relationship with Jesus Christ, this podcast is for you.
Thank you for joining us today.
So we have chapter 11.
I will go through quickly a summary of verses 1 through 31.
Chapter 11, the Lord's burning judgment and the people's complaint is covered in 1-3.
And again, there is a fire that the Lord sends that consumes the outskirts of the camp and
the people cry out.
And Moses then intercedes and God's wrath is quenched by prayer.
I want you to think about that word, Moses intercedes and God's wrath is quenched by prayer.
So we're going to come back to that.
Number two in verses 4 through 9, the non-Israelites begin to grumble and stir up confusion within
the people and they long for the Egyptian food and they're tired of manna.
I wonder why.
So manna is described as that which is like coriander seed in appearance but tastes like
cakes baked with oil.
Well, the Lord gave them an understanding of provision and they got dissatisfied with that.
So Moses' burden and God's delegation of leadership in verses 10 through 17, Moses laments
to the Lord about the wait because he had to lead Israel.
And I would lament to the Lord, too, having covered all the complaints that they have
and the things that they are grumbling about so he's getting tired of carrying that weight.
So God commands Moses to gather 70 elders to share his burden.
So the duplication of ministry, a multifaceted ministry.
You know, there is a lot of ministers today that are one and only of themselves but we
will tell you that in the church there is a multifaceted ministry of elders, of support
people that bring strength because of that number.
So we'll be discussing that.
And the promise of meet and empowerment of the elders in verses 18 through 24, God provides
meet for a full month until it comes out of your nostrils.
Oh boy, think about that.
70 elders gather and God's Spirit rests on them and they prophesy alongside of Moses.
How wonderful that is.
And we're going to think about that little yellow area there.
Now the next part, 25 through 30, it's the prophecy of Eldad and Medan.
Two elders remain in camp yet receive the Spirit of prophecy.
And Joshua objects, remember Joshua always served Moses from young on up.
Moses defends their inclination and their inclusion and desires that all of God's
people to prophesy.
And then last, the quail in wrath and the plague of Chebroth.
Again, the winds bring quail from the sea, the Israelites gorge themselves.
And while the meat is still between their teeth, God's anger strikes with a severe
plague.
The place is named Halabas, meaning graves of craving.
And the camp moves on to Hazrat.
And you can see in there, these four areas are the things that we want to touch tonight.
Intercession, leadership in numbers, anointing.
We touched on that the last time we were here, I'll expand on that a little bit.
And the struggles of trust, which I think we all go through in some time or another
in our life.
So let's look at intercession.
And intercession matters.
It's one of the most, or least rather, talked about elements of Christendom
that I think we have an overall understanding of what the church is.
But I will tell you that prayer and intercession, this is where it begins.
This is where we take care of strongholds.
This is how we bring down resistance.
This is how we get closer to God through interceding for people.
So consequently, that intercession is something that matters.
By definition, it says this.
It is to go and to act between two parties to reconcile.
And that's what intercession is about.
It refers to advocating for another before God.
And I know many of you have done that and are doing it.
We place ourselves between someone and God becoming that reconciling link.
And that is a spiritual application where we can do business before the Lord.
And it's not just asking for help.
Lord, help, help, help Janet and help.
And you go down the list.
It's interceding and empathizing for what they're going through.
In other words, it's bearing the burden.
And that example could be salvation.
It could be healing.
It could be deliverance.
It could be financial provision or other human needs that we begin to enter into
for our brothers and sisters.
In Numbers 11.1, it says this, that people complain about hardship.
So God's anger flares and the fire consumes the outskirts of the temple.
And weren't they scared when God did this?
So what did Moses do?
He didn't run and hide.
He intercedes for the Lord, to the Lord, God, and the fire stops.
So he intercedes.
Another example of this is found in Exodus, which we have covered.
God speaking.
He says this to Moses.
He said, Moses, I have seen how stubborn these people are, and
I'm angry enough to destroy them, so don't even stop me.
So God has his mind made up in this instance.
Think about that.
So Moses, on the other hand, pleads for the Israelites.
And the Lord relented from the harm that he wanted to do.
And then Moses appeals to God's promise and reputation.
And so God basically turns.
And Moses had a conversation with God about the Egyptians and
the thoughts that they would have of God and his promises.
So the question that I ask you, what does the phrase the Lord
relented mean in the broad sense of terms?
What did he do?
He changed his mind.
Does the Lord change his mind?
Yes.
You know, he is righteous.
He cannot fellowship with unrighteousness.
But in so many instances, we ask the Lord to come down in that
unrighteousness and deal with people, intercede for people.
And he goes beyond that, and he goes and
inflicts his love, his surrounding to people.
Think about all the Muslims.
And you've heard the stories about how they are receiving
visions and dreams of God.
And they're repenting.
And I don't know whether it was here, whether I was listening
to something on the radio.
There is a church, and maybe it was Danny that said this.
There's a church in Turkey that's totally Muslim that
people are saved, that saved Muslims that have had visions.
The entire church has had independent visions of God.
And that's how they built their congregation.
So it means that he changed his mind about what he was going
to do.
So let's learn a little bit about what Moses did.
He has a conversation with God.
So he propositions God, not in the sense that you think of
proposition, but I define it here, meaning that there is an
idea or a statement or a consideration that
Moses made to God.
So he intercedes.
So Moses then reminds God of the divine deliverance that
he gave.
Moses begins appealing to God's past faithfulness.
How many have done that?
Lord, but remember when?
Remember this, remember that.
And Lord, I ask.
We ask on our behalf.
And then for you to come and work miraculously.
So he reminds God of what he did.
In Exodus 30 to 11, you brought the people out of
Egypt with great power and a mighty hand.
He underscores that Israel's identity, who they are,
as God's people hinges on the fact of what that
execution was, you know, him delivering them.
Another thing Moses did, he had concern for God's
reputation, and we should have the likewise.
Because God is a reputable God.
He is not something to be fooled with and misunderstood
or taken for granted.
He has a reputation and all of us should want to
maintain a good reputation that is a reflection of God.
So Moses tells God that if he destroys Israel now,
that the Egyptians will say it was with an evil intent
that he brought them out of Egypt.
To kill them in the mountains and wipe them from
the face of the earth.
This is what's gonna happen, Lord.
So Moses leverages the fear of misunderstanding
among the nations as a valid plea of mercy.
Lord, if this is what's gonna happen,
this is what's gonna be, and you can subjugate that
in any way you want, but oftentimes, you know,
when I pray for people, I ask Lord in many instances,
Lord, if you don't come into their life,
they're going to destroy themselves,
because I can see it.
With some of the young people that we pray for,
they're going downhill and downhill and downhill
and downhill, and the end result of Satan
being a conqueror in their life is what kills,
kill and destroy.
So, you know, Lord, this is not what we want.
So again, he leverages that fear.
So then Moses appeals to God and the covenant
that he made with Abraham.
Finally, Moses invokes the covenant promises
made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
Remember your servants to whom you swore by your own self
that you would deliver and make a nation out of them.
And this nation would be recognized among nations,
and that would be the sand of the sea,
and there would be a testimony,
and it would be a living understanding of who you are, Lord.
So he appeals to that.
He insists that wiping out Israel
would nullify God's oath to the patriarchs
and undermine the promise of countless descendants.
And look what has happened.
We ended up now understanding through generations
and generations that there is a nation Israel.
And then Isaiah, this is interesting, 43, 26,
this is where God invites us to have dialogue.
It says this, cause me to remember,
and this is God speaking,
let us plead together,
declare or state that you may be justified.
In other words, he wants you to have dialogue
that is meaningful, and if you feel a certain way,
you can pray that way, and God will hear,
and God's timing will give whatever answer
he shows us to give.
So let's look at Moses dialogue with God
and learn something from it.
So Moses enters in the conflict between God
and the human failure of the Israelites.
His plea demonstrates the prayer offers
a combination of reminders,
that's what we can do, reminders to God,
concerns that we have, and appeals to God.
That's how we can communicate to him.
And what then do we learn?
His intercession is rooted in a true relationship with God.
Now with a relationship with God,
you can do all these things,
but if you're not familiar and you're not abiding
in the presence of God and you have that relationship,
it's very frightening to think that you're gonna remind God
and that you are gonna bring up concerns about that
and you're gonna appeal to him,
because people are afraid to do that.
But in that relationship, you can certainly do that.
Moses speaks to the one who knows God's past deeds.
See, he speaks as the one who knows God's past deeds
and is comfortable in his presence.
And I hope and trust that we all here
are probably preaching to the believers tonight
that we're comfortable.
We can come in and we can enjoy the presence of God.
We can speak our mind.
I will tell you, I've been angry at God.
I'll admit that, you know, and oh, you have two, okay.
Good confession, at least two of us are honest, right?
Okay, all right.
Number two, Moses has an honest dialogue with God.
It can include challenging questions and bold requests.
It may not come to bear, but you can do that.
He loves us anyway.
And then three, Moses reminds God of his word,
which then shifts the posture from despair to expectation.
Thank the Lord for that.
So now let me ask you the question.
In what way or ways do you approach God?
How does that look like?
What does that look like?
Gail?
Well, first of all, I wanted to say that
when we're talking to God,
we have to remember that he already knows
what we're thinking.
Oh, yeah.
So if we try to cover that up, that's stupid
because he already knows what we're thinking
even before we think it.
So we might as well just be honest.
So yeah, I think so that one thing I try to do
is try to be honest first with myself
and then with God when I'm praying
so that I can really get to the nitty gritty
of what it is he wants me to think about and pray about.
You know what I find it sometimes it's harder
for me to be honest about me to me than it is to God.
Because you've come to that relationship
being you just spill your guts
and you can share and you can do whatever.
Well, how does that look to other people?
Yes, Amir?
By surrendering to God.
Surrendering to God, yeah.
So you're gonna surrender.
All right.
Anything else to that?
You wanna think a little bit deeper?
I think the one way I get strong with my faith
is just like by worship songs when I sing.
All right.
So you're setting up before God's presence
and you're magnifying him, which is all good
and you're setting the stage
so that you can communicate to him deeper and deeper.
Yes.
All right, good.
All right, love it.
All right, Jackie, are you itching your head
or you got a, you got a, you got a, no?
I don't need that, but I was thinking I like to pray.
Well, we do it for the people listening.
Like to pray scripture.
All right.
And remind him of his promises
and how he had promised me this and that in the past.
So I like to remember what he's done in the past
and bring it up and request what he can still do
in the future and any day, you know?
So yeah.
That's the safe side, isn't it?
He won't refute scripture.
That's for sure.
All right, okay.
He does have like over 300 promises in the Bible.
And some people say it's a lot more than 300,
but it's definite that there's 300 promises.
How many have you used today?
Maybe one or two.
All right, okay.
Yes, Roger.
Gratitude.
I often, I really have,
especially when it was something completely unexpected.
Oh, amen.
Amen.
Gratitude goes a long way.
We don't assume anything from God,
not by merit, not by works,
but gratitude.
He just gives it to us.
Oh my, that's so wonderful.
All right.
Next question.
How comfortable are you before his presence
to make a case for your friends or loved ones?
I mean, a meaningful case.
Sometimes I set this thing up, Lord.
I mean, you know, this is what's happened.
And like Gail said, he already knows,
but I set it up and I just pray
and I ask the Lord to do wondrous things,
which I think he should be doing in behalf of this person.
So again, what are you comfortable with?
So your worship, your music.
Okay, we have gratitude.
What else do we?
What do we do?
Gail.
Well, once again, it helps if I remember the fact
that God probably loves that person even more than I do.
Yes, yes, yes.
So then that makes me more comfortable
to approach him with their concerns.
And you know what's interesting?
We have synergy of prayer.
If you're praying for the same person
and I'm praying for the same person,
and Roger, there's a synergy of all of us
coming together and storming heaven for that person.
Yeah, then just ourselves alone.
All right, one more question.
Oh no, that's the last question on that one.
All right, our intercession then fights
the invisible kingdom of Satan
who is warring to control the visible world that we live in.
Ephesians 6, 12, nothing new to you.
It says this, for our struggle
is not against flesh and blood,
but against the rulers, against powers,
against world forces, of this darkness,
against the spiritual forces of wickedness
in heavenly places.
And we realize that it's just not what we see,
it's in the heavenly places.
There is battles going on, wars going on.
This is a two tiered system.
There's conflict that's visible that we have.
We see in people's lives the resistance that they have.
We war against that, we ask for the mercy of God
in their life, and so it says in John 3.10,
people love darkness, and we hate darkness,
and that's why we're asking for the light of Christ
to come into their heart.
These powers seek to manipulate,
govern systems, entire cultures, and shape people's,
how they interpret reality,
and again, which all these things do,
they promote blindness and moral decay in people.
He's come to kill and destroy and steal.
The other is in the invisible area and spiritual area.
The forces that shape and empower darkness
in the heavenlies, and you know,
there's plenty of scripture on that.
I cannot go through all that, but we know what that is.
These demonic forces orchestrate deeper attacks
of temptation, deception, and oppression.
I'll give you an example.
When you're aware of heavenly beings in your life
and how God works through you,
and you're aware that there is opposition,
I had said this briefly, and I'll just elaborate on it
by virtue of another example.
I had to be in, I think I don't know where in China,
doesn't matter.
So I booked a hotel, the hotel was full,
and they referred me to another hotel.
Took a taxi, got in there, took my bags up,
or they took the bags up, blah, blah, blah, blah.
So I wanted something to eat,
so I came out of the hotel lobby
and asked the concierge where it would be
a good place for food.
And as soon as I stepped outside
onto the payment of the hotel, forces hit me.
Prostitutes all over the place,
and they were good looking.
I don't deny that.
But now what do I do with that?
Here I'm in a foreign land all by myself.
God doesn't know, no, he does.
And I immediately, I couldn't deal with it.
I asked the Lord, I said, get me through this thing,
and I just closed my eyes, sawed the directions,
and I walked right through the crowd
and got to a safe territory.
I mean, the suppression was demonic.
Another time I was in Arja Bajan.
We did the same thing, and that's evident demonically.
The ladies walked 25 feet in back of the men.
The men go to the restaurant.
We were in a restaurant.
The ladies don't go to the restaurant.
The ladies don't drive.
And all they are is somebody for conjugal rights
to do the laundry to raise the children.
And I will tell you that there was such a demonic oppression,
and the thing that then set it off too is when the prayers,
you know, the call for prayers at the time,
man, it just sends shivers up and down my spine.
And I thought, Lord, this is demonic.
I mean, it's all over the place.
No matter where you go, you were fighting to have freedom
in the sense of understanding who you are
and what you saw as very, very, very real.
So these are my examples.
Anybody else have an example?
Ah, okay.
Yes, Judy.
All right.
Alone that every now and then I watch an English soap opera.
Okay.
But in this storyline, a teenager gets pregnant,
and a family member wants to adopt the baby.
She wants the baby.
Now, I also get on the Facebook page
and talk to the fans over in England,
and that's been kind of like my little escape.
You know, I'm talking to people,
especially last winter,
couldn't get out of the house as much,
was talking to people on the other side of the pond.
The last episode, another relative took her
to the abortion clinic.
And all of the fans, even tonight in the library,
I'm reading, oh, she did the right thing.
And the whole thing with the family member
wanting to adopt the baby,
all of the fans thought that was creepy.
And I'm thinking the opposite.
I'm thinking there's nothing wrong
with giving the baby to your mother to raise,
or the grandmother is my age.
She is not that old.
And she wanted the child.
And years ago, that was actually normative.
It was normative for a family member to adopt
if the biological parent couldn't afford the child.
And that just shows the shift in our society.
It's demonic, we can see it, it's so overt these days.
It's wrong, and I go to work and there's Buddha
and there's pentagrams and skulls
and all of these things on the shelves.
I can remember the time that our ex-president Obama
put the rainbow up over the White House.
Oh my gosh, I saw that, I turned the TV off.
It was so shocking.
So, we have these experiences.
And it's good for us to understand these things
because we know then where we're at.
This is not a casual warfare that we're in.
It's not a skirmish, it's an all-out war of the ages.
And then we must now acknowledge and understand and learn
to influence the spiritual realm
so that we can affect an intercessory prayer,
language, and activity.
We must move beyond the fear that we have of the unseen
and exercise our authority.
I trust how we know how to do that
and I'll just touch on that.
Remember, we are not trying to defeat the enemy,
which is the Satan.
He is already defeated by the cross.
One thing we do not do when we deal with the enemy,
we don't talk to the enemy.
We take the scripture like Jackie uses
and how did Christ come against Satan when he was tempted?
He used scripture and that's all that we do
and we have the authority to tell him to go
to get his hands off of this individual.
We don't do dialogue.
So intercession then is the most selfless thing
that we can do because we are focuses on others, not ourselves.
Being able to hear God's voice
is a critical component of intercession.
It's not that you have the prayer list,
the prayer list only starts the subject matter
and as you wait on God, God will reveal things
that you can pray for for these individuals.
Too often we pray for things in our hearts.
My proposition is instead just spend some quiet time
in his presence and see what he's going to tell you
to pray for for these people.
And that's why you get to worry,
you take an hour, an hour and a half
or all these people that you pray for,
you say, oh my, we've done business before the Lord
because you're looking for understanding
in that situation, that day.
Intercession plows up the soil of the hardened hearts,
the soil that is compacted and extremely hard.
You know, when the farmers plant soil,
they're very careful where they drive their tractors
and around the perimeter where they're always working,
the soil is compact.
Some of them have to take machines
and dig the soil up to make it fertile
because it's so clay filled and hard
that seed wouldn't be planted.
They can drill the hole, put the seed in, the seed will die.
And that's what we're dealing with here,
is a hardened heart.
So what we're asking the Lord to do is soften that.
Powerful breakthroughs come from seeking
and hearing and speaking his mind.
Not what we hope, but what God is telling us.
He will reveal areas that need prayer
to overcome the enemy and declarations against the enemy.
So how do we do that?
Well, these are examples.
We pray for people's spiritual eyes to be opened
to understand the gospel, that's one way to do it.
Another is that we pray that the deception
be broken off of them in the name of Jesus.
Again, Corinthians 10, four, it says destroying speculations.
We pray for the stronghold of pride
that it will be torn down,
that through their lack of pride they have understanding
and they're humble enough to understand
what is happening to them when the Lord speaks to them.
We pray that Satan's strategies and schemes
and control will fail, that's what we do.
We pray for the Holy Spirit again
to surround the person with his power and his love.
All these are examples that we can do
when we can enter into do.
So, we are to use our spiritual weapons
for the destruction of every lofty thing
raised up against God.
What is that?
What's that look like?
How does the mindset of the unsaved work against them
is my question.
How does that all work?
Maybe not the mechanics, but the result of that.
Because people don't have a mindset for God
nor want his will nor desire his will.
So then they're not going to do anything
that is pleasing to God
and it's actually going to work against them
because it says in Hebrews that without faith
it's impossible to please God.
So, how could they ever please God
because they don't even believe in him?
Another thing is that some people are very afraid to yield.
You know, I have one particular person
that in our mission at Meadowood,
can't trust God, can't relate to God.
Want to say something?
Oh, no, you're scratching your neck?
Okay, that's fine, okay.
So, any other thoughts?
Well, I have down here in small notes.
Again, there is hostility that comes against God.
There is spiritual blindness, obviously that happens.
And I was thinking along these lines
about a futile thinking, darkened understanding
and depravity and sin in their life.
Well, the scripture says that the tongue
has the power of life and death.
And those that are unsaved,
I would assume that in some cases
they're gonna say woe is me and that's gonna manifest.
And the things that they say
and the dark things that they think
and the tunnel they go down metaphorically,
that's gonna manifest.
And so, as you mentioned earlier, you know, the gratitude.
If we speak gratitude, if we speak healing,
if we speak peace and hope and love, that'll manifest.
You know, I liken that to often
as we see people lay concrete, they lay the form out.
And we can take that as our declarations.
And on the other side of that,
if it's an unsafe person, they lay the form out,
they declare, they talk about.
And then after a while, what is filled in?
The whole slab is poured because of the declarations
and the activity.
And consequently, like you say, if they believe that,
that's gonna be manifest in their life.
And if woe is me, there's a dark side coming
and I don't know what to do with it,
there's gonna be a dark side.
That's gonna be, they're gonna receive that.
Gail.
There's just one thing that is still in my heart.
When we were talking about being able to hear God's voice
as we're interceding, it's really important
that we obey that, even if it seems to be just the opposite
of what we think we should do.
And I've had personal experience with that
where God said, you need to do this.
And I said, but I know this is what's gonna happen.
And he said, do it anyway,
because I want you to obey me.
And it happened just like I thought when I obeyed,
but I was supposed to learn some things through that.
Hey, you know, you talk about leading.
You know, the people that we pray for is nothing new to God,
is nothing new to us daily.
But as we spend time, that one person's name
that comes up and I have listings of them,
one day I'll pray for something
and as I'm open to the Lord,
I'll pray just another thing about that person
that I didn't even think about.
You know, so God's revelation is coming to us
and speaking life into that.
Yes.
I've had trouble with this spiritual eyes being opened.
I mean, you're witnessing to a person
and you have the simplest explanation
and they can't see it.
And you want to grab them by the throat
and you know, but it's not our job to save anybody.
We're just to proclaim the gospel
and the Holy Spirit will do his work.
You know, as they say,
you want to shake the hell out of them,
another literally.
I don't want to say that.
Welcome back.
How are you?
Good.
Good to see you.
Thank you.
All right.
Okay.
Good stuff.
Another question.
What prayer strategies have you used
to war against Satan?
What kind of, what's that look like?
Define that.
I'm telling you how being open,
I find that I pray for that person
in different ways in different seasons as I'm open.
The person doesn't change,
but the counter attack, you know,
may be the same on that person
from a dark side or from Satan side,
but there are various things that God reveals to us
as we pray variously for this particular person.
How does that, what's that look like?
Yes.
I have spiritual warfare prayers at home.
I've committed to memory from a friend of mine
that runs exchange life ministries
and also from her friend, Glenn Rosenberger,
who goes to Calvary Church of Satterton.
He's heavily into spiritual warfare,
you know, Neil T. Anderson,
and one thing I usually pray is for one,
I get forgiveness for my sins.
I clean myself up right away,
and I pray, please forgive me if I've harmed so and so.
Please restore to them whatever was lost.
Please bring good out of any evil that I've done.
That's another one, and another thing I pray is,
please bless those who have cursed me
and reveal yourself to them.
Yeah, and sometimes that's hard because you're natural.
Well, you know, if that's the way they feel, you know,
yeah, so what?
I'm not gonna have an association with them,
but going beyond the second and third mile.
Anything else?
Yes.
One thing also that I know I pray for
when we're doing a prayer strategy
is to silence the enemy's voice,
if they're hearing lies or if I'm hearing lies,
and to only hear the voice of God.
As the spirit whispers to us,
so does Satan whisper to them, doesn't he?
Yeah, that's true.
Oh, I'm sorry.
Yeah, whatever it is that the person may be suffering from,
you pray the opposite into them,
so if they've got depression, you pray joy.
You know, if they don't have health,
or if they don't have health, you pray health,
and you pray comfort, and you pray the anxiety,
you pray peace, so you replace the things
that Satan brings, the things that Holy Spirit brings.
Yeah, we had our ecumenical prayer this morning,
and one individual was praying to the Lord
and discussing her woe is me daughter-in-law
that was working against her son,
and she was rehearsing to God all the terrible things
that this lady was doing to her son,
and I thought, boy, we're getting far, far-field in this,
but you know, I'm not gonna step in and whatever,
that's this understanding, but you're right.
Whatever is in their life, we pray against that.
I mean, that's hitting it right between the eyes.
Yes.
Well, I really love the authority of the name of Jesus.
It's all powerful.
It just confronts, I mean, Satan just has to wither,
his tail goes between his legs and he leaves.
There's nothing to it.
If it's nothing, just repeating the name
over and over again.
No, and just reminding exactly, you know,
if I'm with a person, just reminding,
you're a child of God, this is not of the Lord,
and I agree with my sister with the lies,
and just coming against the lies,
because Jesus is truth,
and you just have to tell them what's what.
You know, I find myself when dealing with people
and you're in conversation and things come up,
I'm under my breath praying, you know,
and now I have to concentrate, okay, Lord,
you're giving me insights in here,
and then I want to listen to the conversation.
I don't want to be removed from it,
but you're doing two things at the same time.
Yes.
What did Jesus do when he was confronted by Satan?
Just quoted scripture.
Quoted scripture, I'm sorry.
We don't converse with the opposition.
Oh, I'm here.
Yeah, I was just gonna say the same thing when Ron said it.
Yeah, read the scripture,
but my favorite one is the Psalm 23,
and I just like to repeat that in all over the enemy,
so yeah.
Yes, yeah, amen.
Do it, do it, do it, victory dances.
Thank you, Lord.
All right.
And topic two.
Oh boy, we're gonna zoom through this.
All right, leadership and numbers.
Numbers 11, 14, the job is too much for me.
How can I take care of all these people?
So Moses laments to the Lord
about the weight of leading Israel.
So without elders or spiritual covering,
that, again, is enough to support what he needs
and what the people need.
There are challenges that come if there's not support there.
You can see it in his lament to the Lord.
Both spiritually and again the structure of the church
is such that there are problems that will come
if it's a single leadership.
I mean, I wanna ask you how many people
have fallen from ministry in the last two years?
I can name on my hands 12 people that I know of.
I mean prominent people.
By and large, they were one man, ministry.
Leaders who today are also called elders
provide a safeguard for the local church.
They are spiritually mature men who guide,
shepherd, and lead with integrity.
They guide, in other words, in 1 Peter 5, 1, 3,
it says, care for and spiritually nurture the congregation.
They guard, Titus 1, 9, teach and protect
the truth of the gospel.
They lead with integrity, 1 Timothy 3, Titus 1.
Those who live above reproach,
demonstrating humility, wisdom, and hospitality.
They functionally discern and help set
the spiritual direction and vision of the church.
And they support both the pastoral leaders
and the congregation with one accessibility,
spiritual covering, counsel, caregiving,
and help mediate in conflict, strengthen numbers.
So question, how does a leader's consistency
between the words that he says and his actions
impact your confidence in their ministry
and guidance toward you?
How does that impact?
Yeah, because you can look at the life and the life speaks.
All right, anything else?
Well, no, their example as to how they live
is often better than the words they say.
Yes, yes, sometimes we don't have words to say.
All we can do is grieve with people
and they're gaining strength from who we are.
Anyone else?
All right, thank you, Roger.
All right, as I see it then,
leaders live to serve the body of Christ.
Elders are spiritual anchors,
willing to serve in many capacities,
being present and available to other people.
That's preeminent.
They do not seek to control
for position, attention, or recognition.
They go the second mile with those
that are hurting and in need.
And there is a deep relationship with God
that they should be having in order to lead people.
They have learned the value of the relationship
with the Lord and want to teach that to others.
Their ability to impact that knowledge,
shepherding and guiding and shielding.
And they're living out their character
by supporting the leadership in decisions,
direction, and activities.
The capacity for wisdom, discernment, and compassion.
They walk with the Lord in good times
and bad times, the way I can say amen to that.
Having learned his teachings by experience.
That's why we're not to put any young people
into leadership because of perhaps their youthfulness
and we have seasoned people
that are represented here in the body.
Not withholding any good thing from people
and providing positive protective authority
and intercession and oversight for believers.
The question is then, what, if any,
accountability structures do you use
in maintaining and developing your spiritual health
or do you even think it is necessary?
Well, I'm okay.
I don't need the elders.
Is that a good assumption?
No, okay, I'm shaking head no.
All right, what do you do when you say I don't need?
You shortcut the lifeblood of the body
because each sinew and ligament strengthens
and informs and helps the other.
So if you don't ask for help,
if you don't take that burden that you have
and share that, I can do it alone, I'm okay.
You rob the body of ministry.
You don't allow that ebb and flow
of relationship to develop and the empathy
that brother or that sister has for you.
Did I see a hand?
Yeah, go ahead, Gail.
Well, also as you're dealing with people,
as you're being with people, as you're forbearing people,
as you get to know them,
then you know better how to pray for them as well.
So it kind of all works together.
But we have to remember that the same spirit dwells
in each of us.
So we have that spirit of unity within us to start with
and we should start there.
Don't deny your brother and sister of ministry to you.
Don't deny that.
If that's something that you need, you do it.
Well, it's iron sharpens iron.
That's when you end up reacting with people,
you're not only helping them,
you're learning about yourself.
Not the truth.
You learn about yourself, right?
How willing are you?
What do they say?
It always takes another person to put that last nail in.
You can't do it yourself.
All right, anointing.
The calling of these men had already taken place in verse 25.
The Lord came down and the clouds spoke to him.
He took some of the spirit that he had given Moses
and he gave it to the 70 elders.
When the spirit came to them,
they began to shout like prophets, but not for long.
And then two of the other elders,
the L dad and me dad had stayed in the camp
and they didn't go out to the tent.
And there in the tent, the spirit came to them
and they too began to shout and prophesy.
All right, the spirits resting on these men led to prophecy.
And remember, calling is accomplished
and accompanied with anointing.
You don't have anointing before you have the calling.
So the calling comes and God anoints
and gives you the power to execute
what he has called you to do.
So that's what happened.
God's plan to bless and edify
comes in many different giftings and callings.
Receiving God's anointing is this.
Anointing transcends any and all expectations.
Well, what is the anointing, God?
What is that, John?
Explain that.
You know, you can go on and on and on.
God's anointing is not confined
just to special people like Moses
or special places like the Tent of Meeting,
but it's part and parcel of what he is doing
in your life at the calling.
And remember, you realize that the calling
and the anointing God entrusts to you
is a gift and not a reward.
He can take that away if you're not diligent to pursue it.
He gives it to you as trust.
When you are anointed, you are empowered
to do the calling that God has given you
and you learn to handle the anointing by what?
Keeping yourself humble.
You ain't humble, you ain't got anointing.
You know, so many ministries have overlooked that
and have fallen when pride comes in.
And you can see the ministry begin to move.
And I just had a, I don't know where it was today.
I was looking at something
and I just saw a little blurb about Benny Hinn
and I thought, oh my gosh,
there was a man that was used to God
and here he is and so much compromise in his life now.
It just made me feel bad.
All right, don't try to control God.
A young man ran out to tell Moses
that L dad and me dad, what they were doing.
Then Joshua, who had been Moses' helper
since he was a young man spoke up and said,
Moses, stop them, sir.
And Moses answered, are you concerned about my interests?
I wish that the Lord would give his spirit
to all his people and make all of them shout like prophets.
All right, always celebrate what God's doing
in different and strange ways.
Don't criticize for a moment
because God may be doing something
that you're not used to.
Something different completely.
Again, when we talk about revelation these days
and we talk about restoration
and we talk about the visitation,
God's not going to visit his people
like he did of the Jesus movement.
I believe that he'll visit young people first.
I believe that there will be an outpouring
because that's what starts the crescendo
but other than that, I have no preconceived ideas
because God is a variable God
when it comes to sharing what he wants to share.
In Job 5.9 it says, he performs wonders
that cannot be fathomed and miracles
that cannot be counted, and that's us.
Anointing should lead us to unity,
not fear, division, or competition.
The anointing in this case was prophecy
of the individuals it would use
to confirm the Lord leading these people
to ministry, to be elders.
And this experience should have caused division,
could have caused division,
but Moses, he interceded and his wisdom,
he used it to affirm God's generosity
and desire to empower many.
So how do we reconcile our desire to control
with God's claim to rule the nations?
Is there a conflict going on the inside?
Who is in control?
And maybe I'm speaking to the congregation tonight.
I don't know.
You probably are here, you understand.
Oh, Roger, you want to confess
or you want to add something?
Oh, okay.
I'm just saying what we're controlling
is delegated from God.
Yes, and no more, right?
That's right.
We don't usurp our authority.
That's right.
Right, that's right.
So we're part of God's control.
Yes, under his control.
Amen.
Anyone else?
All right, okay.
All right, struggles of trust.
We'll go through these things.
Israel's struggle between trusting God's provision
and succumbing to fleshly cravings.
The quail arrived, the people hoarded the quail,
they gorged themselves, God got angry
and he sent a plague and the people died.
Question, why did God get angry?
Why did he get angry?
A lack of gratitude?
Ah, they weren't grateful.
Give me more.
Let me stuff my mouth full of it.
Yeah, greed.
Greed, same thing.
Sister together, sister and brother together.
What should we be do but be humble servants
before the Lord?
If we're not, again, we receive ministry
but ministry can be taken away also.
Just remember that as you propagate the scriptures
as you seek God for your ministry,
it's something that we hold dearly
and part of that being able to hold it
is the humility that we have and the appreciation.
The reflex of a heart that is consumed
with greed and gratitude, we said that.
This is a stark warning.
It's allowing the earthly longings
and again to supersede dependence on God.
Human hearts can turn blessings into cursings.
We have seen that.
Persistent in gratitude provokes his righteous judgment.
We saw that.
God can turn a gift into judgment
when his provision is met with selfishness
in gratitude and pride.
So the question then is, in what areas of your life
do you find it hardest to trust him and surrender control?
Anything?
Ah, another confession?
All right, okay.
No, earlier in my life when I was young,
provision, it was very hard to trust
that he would provide.
In other words, you could do it.
You didn't need God's provision.
Yeah, yeah.
I can do it my way.
Did you sing that song Frank Sinatra used to sing?
I did it my way.
All right, so you repented from that.
Okay, good deal.
Anything else?
All right.
All right, we're about wrapping up here.
Another question.
How have past disappointments impacted your willingness
to rely on God's timing?
Sometimes when we are impatient
and we want now as the answer, Lord, now.
I need it, I demand it now.
You know, then I have a tendency in my own life
thinking that, okay, because the way
that I interacted with God,
he's just gonna withhold and see where that all goes.
Look at the heart.
What is in the heart?
All right, and the last question is,
what daily practices help you hand over control to God?
What practices do you do?
Dottie?
No, go ahead, that's fine.
No, I don't know if it's a practice or not,
but I have to, it's a discipline for me,
knowing myself.
I have to surrender to the Holy Spirit.
And let him take control of the day
and let him take control of the situations.
So now, let me go a little bit further.
What's the best time for you to do that, in the afternoon?
Oh no, top of the morning.
Good morning.
As I know myself.
You know, I'm more convinced because God got up before,
Jesus got up before sunset,
before sunrise and went out and prayed.
I am even more firming.
I mean, I'm telling my guys, my boys, three of them,
you know, the best time before you start to run a life,
and I mean, they're running 80 miles an hour,
give the Lord his due in the morning.
The morning, the morning, yeah, but.
So one guy, he gets up and he drives from Fairview Village
up to Bethlehem at the hospital that he works at.
So he has an hour.
He just used to do what I, or he does what I used to do.
I had an hour of cathedral time going up
and an hour of cathedral time coming home.
The other guys, not so much.
So what do you say about that?
There's not constraining, but what do you find?
I know you do morning.
So you do morning because you can't get,
all right, okay, that's good.
Morning.
Morning before I get out of bed.
All right, good.
Oh, okay, that's good.
Anyone else?
Want to bear their soul here?
Yes.
Well, I'll confess that I put my coffee on first.
Oh, I do that too.
Use the bathroom and then I read my scriptures
in the morning.
Okay, I will confess that's what I do too.
Coffee before the Lord.
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
All right, application for us today.
First, resist with faith.
Determine that you will yield.
Number two is redirect your longings toward eternal things.
And three, cultivate a posture of gratitude.
That's the way we come against our flesh.
I'm not gonna ask you these questions.
Chris says that it has to be one hour,
so now we're over.
I'll blame it on him.
How can we discern when a legitimate desire risks
becoming a craving that crowds out dependence on God?
How do we discern that?
I discern it, what you said,
I discern it because I know my pattern is this.
I get up, I go to the little boy's room,
I make the coffee, I sit down and then I start.
Well, if something comes up,
then I'm all messed up during the day
because you put that thing in there and then it goes on
and then Joni says, well, we haven't, we haven't.
Okay, or the phone rings.
I'll turn that off, okay.
Or something or other comes up.
Now, the only caveat is when we get up for prayer
on Wednesday with our ecumenical friends,
we put that aside and then we do it individually
during the process of the day.
But if I find I don't stick with that regime,
it's very hard to get back into that again
because that's the way that we do it.
And what does trusting God mean to you
in a practical, everyday term?
What does that mean, trusting God to you?
What's that look like?
Being content.
Okay, all right, that's good.
Godliness with contentment is a great game.
Just kind of saying, you know, it is what it is
and if this is what God wants, then it's fine, you know, at all.
Question, do you labor to enter into that
or does that now come natural in your Christian life?
I mean, I would say in general,
I don't really strive for like more of something.
You know, I just assume, you know,
God will open a door when it's time.
And if he doesn't, he doesn't.
Like, I don't like, like really press in, you know.
So maybe I should more times,
but I don't really like see something that like,
I gotta have like whatever,
whether it's a thing or an experience,
it's usually not like something that I just crave.
You know what I mean?
It's so, I mean, I'm not like, you know, promoting myself.
I just say, I don't really can't,
I can't resonate right now with that.
Ginger, hello there.
My other thing, but letting go of,
but trusting God means letting go of my will.
Yeah, not hard sometimes.
Yeah, yeah, it's like just.
How do you do that?
I don't wanna put you on the spot.
Well, it's always an inner battle of,
you know, kind of a type personality.
I can do things.
I can do it, right.
I can do it.
I, so letting go of the I, and it's hard.
It's a perennial struggle.
Well, we'll have alter call after we finish tonight.
No, I'm just kidding.
All right, let me hear anything.
No, all right, here we go.
For me, I think trusting God is not like,
you're gonna get everything you want.
Sometimes the God promises are reading
at mark number 30, just for instance, you know,
and if I give up on mark number 10,
this is like giving up so early.
So we gotta trust God for everything, you know,
it's like your life is dependent on it, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, no, that's good.
All right, Chris.
Like Roger was saying earlier, I do think like,
it is always like a struggle, like the balance between,
like you have responsibilities and you have to do them.
So it does require work, life is work.
So it's like, so that's where sometimes it's difficult
to like say like, what is my responsibility?
What's God's?
So you just do what you do every day
and God will either bless it or,
well, he's always blessing it,
but he'll either say, yeah, don't do that anymore,
do more of that, but it's just kind of that balance
of being active, you know, and trusting God, you know.
You wanna see something?
Yeah.
I'm really finding in my faith that
really trusting God is like trusting a person.
It is.
The more you know him, the more, you know,
what is character and it's just easier to trust him
the more you know in his ways.
Like Moses said, he knew his ways
and I can't say I know God's ways,
but I know in the word, the more I read the word,
the more I read the word, live in this life.
You know, just trusting him and who he is,
he's for us, he's not against us.
He really is, he loves us.
It's a shame we learn so late in life, isn't it?
I think I learned to trust in God
rather than trusting Ron.
I found that Ron doesn't know as much as he thought he did
and he gets behind the eight ball quite often.
So I really learned to trust in God
in just about everything.
When I come to decisions, I go to him.
He usually has, he always has the answer,
not usually, but he always has the answer.
When you were saying about I'm not as smart
as I thought I was,
your wife was back, it was going like this.
No, I, no.
Yeah, I was just gonna say that I think for me,
trusting God is, this is gonna sound really trite,
but it is a life of faith.
And you know, until you have the rug
really pulled out from under you,
you don't realize how much you're not trusting God.
Amen, I can tell you better than that.
And then when the rug gets pulled out,
the Lord and I have had minced a few words
and I have found out just how much I don't trust God.
But then you learn to walk in faith
and he can handle my anger and frustration
and my infantile walk, you know,
but that's, to me, that's what trusting God is.
It's just that life of faith of learning to walk with him.
Well, in order for me to have understanding
of what trusting God was after 15 years in the ministry,
the Lord pulled the rug out from underneath
and I ended up with nothing.
Most of you know the story, won't go there, too late.
I can say today that I know less about the Lord
than I did then, because I knew all the answers then.
Today, Lord, this is today, what's on your plate today?
That's all that I know is to be a servant for this day only.
Lord, look at this prayer, Psalm 73.20, Paul.
What else do I have in heaven but you?
And since I have you, what else could I want on earth?
Nothing, nothing at all.
Lord, we'd thank you tonight, precious Lord,
that by and large, those that it were within Earshod
have probably experienced most of what's been said tonight,
but it is a rehearsing once again
of your scripture to affirm in our hearts
that you are the life that we want and need.
And as this Psalm states, since I have you, Lord,
what else could I want on earth?
Father, we realize that we are passerby's,
we are pilgrims in this land,
and we are looking to go beyond
and spend eternity with you around your throne,
giving you the crowns that we may have received,
giving you our love, our praise,
and we thank you that we can do that,
and there is a confidence in our hearts
that when we leave this body, we will be with you.
And then we pray these things in your name,
and everybody said, amen.
Thanks for joining us at Lansdale Life Church
as we praise God and discuss his word.
Don't forget to join us for Worship Lives Sunday mornings
at 10 a.m. Eastern on YouTube.
Be blessed and have a great day.